thistlechaser: (black cat looking up)
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I was poking about at new items for the coming WoW expansion, and I came across one called Good Fortune. That stopped me in my tracks, sending my mind back to this book. The Cat Who Went to Heaven. Thinking further about it, I think this was the start of my Major Issues with religion.

If you haven't read it (and you really should), it's a children's book about a poor painter in Japan. While he has no money for food for himself, a cat (named Good Fortune) becomes part of his household. The painter comes to love her.

The local Buddhist temple hires the painter to do a picture of the dying Buddha with the animals of the world come to pay their respects. He has to leave cats out of it, because "cats are cursed, because of their pride and sense of superiority, which caused them to refuse to bow before the Buddha in his lifetime".

But the painter loves his cat and she's heartbroken because there's no cat in the painting. In the end, he adds a small cat in the corner of the painting, even knowing that doing so may make the temple reject his panting and thus make him die of hunger. Upon seeing the cat has been added, Good Fortune dies "of happiness".

And the temple does reject the painting. The painter is in disgrace. Starving. But then, miracle! The painting has magically changed! The dying Buddha is now extending his hand to the cat, blessing it!

Writing all this up, dabbing tears from my eyes, I see this is likely the start of my issues with kitties dying, too. :P

On one hand, someone commissioning art can request anything they want. "Draw me a picture with every animal in the world BUT NO CATS" is a valid request. But "...BUT NO CATS BECAUSE THEY'RE CURSED AND EVIL AND WON'T BOW DOWN TO OUR GOD" is a different story.

But more than that, it bothers me that cats would be thought of that way. (And it's not just in Buddhism, how many black cats are killed around Halloween because they're "witches" and "evil"?)

The whole book just made me so sad for so many reasons. Why do religions need to hate? Exclude? Groups of people, kinds of animals?

...And why did the cat have to die in the story? *sniffles*

Date: 2012-08-03 08:27 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] awhisperofdusk.livejournal.com
From what the internet is telling me, the whole 'Buddhists don't like cats' thing isn't true. They're lumped in with all the animals, and in some folklore, have a revered place. So the specific example seems fishy, but the general point stands on why some religions hate. I'm unsure about the black cat thing and Halloween-- while that used to happen in waves in Europe, from what I understand, it's an urban legend now.

I'd argue it's a human thing, not so much a religious thing.
Edited Date: 2012-08-03 08:30 pm (UTC)

Date: 2012-08-03 08:50 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] thistle-chaser.livejournal.com
Yeah, I did some quick googling after making the post, and I couldn't find anything about current dislike of cats in the Buddhism religion. It wasn't a long search, I'm at work, but if it were currently true, you'd think it would be easier to find. The book was based on an old Buddhist folk tale.

As for cats and Halloween, as of last year, the ASPCA has recommended that people keep their black cats especially, but all cats, inside over Halloween (I got a mailing about it). Snopes has a writeup of some Halloween cat issues, various religions and non-religious both (http://www.snopes.com/horrors/mayhem/blackcat.asp).

When I was a kid, the people who lived across the street from me were very religious (Born Again Christians). They refused to celebrate Halloween and they thought all cats were of the devil/demons.

It's likely both.

Date: 2012-08-03 09:36 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] awhisperofdusk.livejournal.com
I would question it being based on a folktale, considering it was written by a white woman in 1930 and refers to Heaven. As for Snopes: it agrees that the alarm over cat-killings during Halloween is mostly manufactured. For individual hate of cats, that's a more Christian thing. For example, Muslims hold cats in high regard because of Muezza.

We're going to have to agree to disagree re: the nature of religion, I think. I can get where you're coming from, though!

Date: 2012-08-04 12:52 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] prettyredeyes.livejournal.com
Elizabeth Coatsworth traveled the Far East and spent time around Buddhist monasteries and that influenced her work, so it very well could have been based on an old folktale.

Some sects of Buddhism deal with an idea that has been known to be translated as 'Heaven' by Westerners, and considering the audience Coatsworth was marketing to at the time I would not be surprised if some of the story was adjusted to make it easier for Western children unfamiliar with the Buddhist tradition to understand.

But anyhoo regardless of the story's roots the same message remains (and it's not that Buddhists hate cats).

Date: 2012-08-04 02:43 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] awhisperofdusk.livejournal.com
I have to repeat my doubt, as the folktale shows up nowhere on the internet, and the tale takes place in Japan, a place that's more than recorded its own tales and myths. Mahayana Buddhism asserts that the intervention of the bodhisattvas is needed to attain the Pure Land or 'Heaven' (at least for most lay people). I'm unsure if they would paint the Buddha or a bodhisattva in a religious work, as the bodhisattvas are much more important in Pure Land Buddhism.

What it comes down to is that-- as good as the story is-- she either changed it to the point where it no longer resembles the original myth in the interests of domestic consumption, or she created the folktale.

Date: 2012-08-04 02:54 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] prettyredeyes.livejournal.com
Right, which is why I said that regardless of how she arrived at the tale, the message remains and it's unfair to say that she completely invented the entire thing because of her background.

Date: 2012-08-03 08:41 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] ani-mama.livejournal.com
Buddhists do not hate cats. At least not in my neck of the woods. I think, if this is a true folktale, it might be more of a "see, cats are actually really nice!" kind of thing. If cats are considered bad luck, Japan would not be full of smiling good luck cat statues.

I do agree that too many religions exclude and hate, but much of that is due to the people in the organizations, not the actual religion.

Date: 2012-08-03 08:51 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] thistle-chaser.livejournal.com
Yeah, I did think about the story being seen from that direction. Maybe the point of the tale was to explain how cats came to be accepted and loved, not that they were left out.

but much of that is due to the people in the organizations, not the actual religion

Agreed. And it makes me sad.

Date: 2012-08-03 09:11 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] evilgrayson.livejournal.com
Religions hate and exclude because religions are of humanity, and humanity hates and excludes even if their deity tells them not to.

Some people are all over 'I died for your sins' but forget about 'Love thy neighbour' being 'not just the people just like me'. And that's before you get into all sorts of other thorny issues about people picking and choosing which bits of their religion they want to follow.

Date: 2012-08-03 09:43 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] thistle-chaser.livejournal.com
Religions hate and exclude because religions are of humanity, and humanity hates and excludes even if their deity tells them not to.

That's a really food way of phrasing it.

To your whole comment: Yeah. All that crap with Chick-fil-A yesterday, all I could think about was the whole "love your neighbor" and "Judge Not Lest Ye Be Judged" type things.

I'm not a Bible expert, but didn't Jesus love everyone? "Love the sinner, hate the sin"?

The whole thing makes me sad.

Date: 2012-08-04 05:46 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] veloxe.livejournal.com
because of their pride and sense of superiority

Seems legit. Although I don't think it's a sense of superiority so much as it is that they are just superior. I mean hell they get us to clean up their poop for them and have us sitting there wiggling a piece of string for hours on end. We are simply playthings to them.

Date: 2012-08-05 07:24 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] thistle-chaser.livejournal.com
We are, for sure! And we're lucky they allow us to. :P

But, assuming there is an afterlife at all, if there aren't cats there, it will be a lesser place.

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